Downey : Mayor’s Trial Postponed

The conflict-of-interest trial of Downey Mayor James S. Santangelo has been rescheduled to Aug. 3 to allow the defense time to review thousands of documents in the case, a prosecutor said. Santangelo was scheduled to be tried May 4 on a misdemeanor charge that he had a conflict of interest in 1984 when he voted to expand the city’s redevelopment district, in which he owned land. Santangelo has since sold the land in question.

Retired Municipal Court Judge Mario Barsotti granted the postponement to allow Santangelo’s attorney, Leo P. Newton, time to sift through about 5,000 pages of documents collected by the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office, Deputy Dist. Atty. Herbert Lapin said.

Santangelo cast the deciding vote in July, 1984, to expand Downey’s 125-acre redevelopment district by adding about 380 acres along Firestone Boulevard. A Superior Court judge invalidated the new redevelopment area in 1985.